


Bury Your Failures

by dunbarisms



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DC Extended Universe, DCEU, DCU, Titans (TV 2018)
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M, Other, not romantic in any level, we will see, well not at first anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-10-01 03:44:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17236766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dunbarisms/pseuds/dunbarisms
Summary: Sometimes he thinks he was always destined to die. If Bruce haven't found him, who knows, maybe he would've ended up like his father, in jail. Dead. Or like his mother, overdosed, dead. If that was better than his actual death (beaten at 17 with a crowbar, a psycho clown taunting him, breaking every bone, begging for bruce) it's yet to be decided.What he does know is that he wouldn't change the happy, messy middle he had with bruce. And how alive it felt to be Robin.





	Bury Your Failures

**Author's Note:**

> I love the young Jason that Titans (2018) is giving us. This will be blending that universe with canon knowledge of Jason, set in the future of this universe in which, of course, Jason is red hood. Though most chapters will be set in the past, exploring his relationships with mainly Bruce and Dick. Might be some romance or tension here and there, as usual. Mostly Bruce and Jason. Also, the show proclaims Jason is 19 but I'm making him a little younger like his comic book counterpart, making him 17 soon to turn 18.

**Chapter 1.** Introduction.

He was going to end up dead anyways. Bruce jut delayed that when he took him in. It's something Jason thinks about a lot, in those endless nights he doesn't sleep, he doesn't _**want** _to sleep, because all he sees and hear is that clown; laughing, taunting, beating him. Even when awake, Jason swears he can feel that maniac's cackle, constantly with him until he dies again. But Jason doesn't fool himself. He was born to the lowest of the lowest of Gotham.

If anything, death would've caught him sooner or later. It just happened to be later. Jason lived on the streets, first with his abusive and absent father, but Willis was taken to prison and then, his mother, while still absent during his life, she was his mother. And she overdosed. He had been the one who found the body. But before the cops could take him to an orphanage, Jason ran away.

And the streets and him became one and the same. Even if his Uncle Ray often came by to try and help him, Jason wasn't stupid, he knew his uncle was trouble, as everyone on his family. And in Gotham, children end up in one of three ways: dead using drugs, taken, kidnapped by deranged people or taken to work in one of Gotham's night clubs, doing whatever the clients wanted to them. Jason always ran the opposite direction when he saw those recruiting, taking. He just ran. Did petty crimes.

He got some money for himself in that way. Stealing and selling. And one day, he just thought taking the _tires of the Batmobile_ would be a good idea. If he managed to do that, he would sell them for plenty, maybe buy himself good food for once. Instead, he was found by the Bat.

And that was the first night he ate good. And the next days, he was found by the police, who took him to an orphanage, as he didn't want to. And then, just like magic, someone came to take him in. Him, a boy of 16, back then, being picked amongst other children (younger, better, more easy to handle). And by Bruce Wayne. Bruce _**fuckin**_ ' Wayne. At first he thought the old man wanted something, it's what one comes to expect from living on the streets. Most people from Gotham's best side of town were all crooks, posers who took children in just to groom them; take them and never return them.

But Bruce just gave him a home. The billionaire's butler treated him with respect, always filling him with praise when Jason managed to do something he wasn't supposed to. Jason was smart, even if school had always been awful to him; but he picked up things easy, he was fast and adaptable. One had to being born in Gotham's belly. That's why he found out very easily that Bruce was Batman. He was no fool. It wasn't a coincidence that Batman found him stealing his tires, gave him a meal and a pat in the back and only days later, Bruce Wayne waltz into his life to show him a good path.

Still, Jason remembers that he was still shocked when he saw the cave for the first time. Or when he saw Bruce in the suit, cowl down, showing his face and the bat symbol. Or when he saw a peak of the worn down Robin suit, hanging because no one was using it, in a glass case by one of the corners. And he knew back then and there that he wanted to be Robin. _**So much**_.

........o...........o..............o..........o...........o..........o

" _ **Holy fuck.**_ " The young man murmurs as he comes down from the stairs, eyes fixed on the giant cave that lied under the Mansion and he had no idea. Bruce, standing at the bottom of the stairs on his Batman suit, emotions unreadable on his features, though Jason swore to see a little twitch at him swearing. Bruce never liked when Jason swore. And he did that a lot. He had a dirty mouth. 

Green eyes gaze up to meet Bruce's blue ones with excitement  before he moves to the console, cameras all over Gotham's streets showing its people; their criminals. Open files on the rogues. But his eyes can only see one thing; the display of an old, thorn Robin suit. And it's like a calling, his hand reaching to the case, pressing there with gentle touch, turning slightly to the old man before him (even if Bruce is just on his mid thirties and isn't exactly that old).

Bruce had planned this. Or at least, it had crossed his mind the moment he saw Jason on the streets, trying to steal the tires of his batmobile. The sheer force and danger in the boy's eyes as he picked him up back then. The boy wanted to fight, the streets had done him wrong and he wanted to return the favor. Similar to Dick. But never like him. He knew that very well. Dick was like him; loosing his parents, wanting revenge, looking for an outlet, but never as dark as Bruce was. Dick was his better in that regard. Jason? Jason was all of Bruce's darkness. All that evil he picked up that night in Crime Alley. And while Bruce picked that up with the years and the death of his parents, Jason grew up with all of that.

And he knows how people end up in Gotham. Bruce wants to save him. Or at least, offer him a way out. To not let him end up like Willis and Catherine Todd. " _I want to be Robin._ " Pouty mouth speaks up as green eyes; always with force, look at him. Determination. Willingness. Strength. Alfred had told him the boy wasn't ready yet.

But if this was Jason's choice, then Bruce will give it to him. But not right away. No. Training come first, testing him. Signs of trust. If anything, he will be different than he was with Dick. Dick was grace, his years with the circus teaching him agility and acrobatics. Jason is all dirt and fists. His strength is in his ability to improvise, using his fists. Quick, short distance combat. Different Robins, different approach. Bruce also notices something else. Jason trust him far more than Dick ever did. It's overwhelming at first; but the boy has a blind faith in him, in his eyes he can do no wrong. And while that is a lie...Bruce finds it refreshing. 

He needs that cockiness, that excitement for the job.

"You will need training." The suited man walks past his now new protege and to the screens, typing information through the screen. "And I will need to know where you are. **Always**. At all times." Jason doesn't even protest. Bruce was sure there would be a protest, considering Jason was very independent from him.  "Robin should never engage in a fight without Batman's orders."

"Sure, man, whatever you want. I got your back, bro." Eyes brighten up, Jason always finds a spot to stand beside Bruce. Even without the suit, he was already working as Robin, standing by his side, being the younger, excitable bait. There is a smirk on the boy's lips, soon pursuing as they do something like a pout, only that he looks happier than when one does that. "Batman needs a Robin, right? You got one. An improvement, I know the other dude left you, Bruce."

It's a sore spot, but Bruce doesn't say anything. If anything, that is the only thing that bothers Jason, that he can't read Bruce's emotions or anything. The man is standing so still that it was scary. _Maybe that was the point_. "I would never leave you. **Ever**." _And I don't want to loose you_ , he wants to add, but he isn't sure that it would do any good for Bruce to listen to that, and maybe, saying that would ruin the moment, would ruin his opportunity to finally belong and have a purpose.

It seems like an eternity when Bruce barely nods, hands moving away from the computer. "Tomorrow we begin your training. 7 am sharp. Here." And he doesn't have to say anything else for Bruce puts on his cowl and drives away on the Batmobile, leaving Jason standing there with his thoughts, in an empty cave.

He vaguely hears Alfred calling for him; something about the food being ready. And he is aware of his own voice saying he was right back up. But Jason doesn't move, just looks at the torn Robin suit and thinks of the one before him; Dick Grayson. Who left. Still wearing a Robin suit but not wanting to be one as Robin doesn't work without Batman. Everyone knows it.

It's right there that Jason makes himself a promise to be better; to not live on the other's shadow. Robin 2.0 was not going to be just a replacement, he was going to be better, he was going to enjoy his work as Dick never did. He was going to make Bruce proud.

 

Sitting in a rooftop, almost ten years later; a crimson bat on his chest and hoisting two guns by his hips, Jason could laugh at his naivete.  **He was so wrong.**

 


End file.
